NEUROBIOLOGY AND THE QUEERNESS OF KINSHIP 101equivalent) (Willey and Giordorno 2011). However, its agentic capacities
have expanded to include a host of potential social roles. Its sociality was
first explored in animal research on memory in the 1960s; in this literature,
it is roughly associated with increased recall of positively experienced social
stimuli and poorer recall of negative social stimuli (MacDonald and Mac-
Donald 2010). In the late 1980s oxytocin’s roles extended to include sexual
behavior when researchers observed an increase in sexual activity of fe-
male mice they had injected with oxytocin (den Hertog et al. 2001; Herbert
1994). Researchers now believe oxytocin is released during orgasm as well
as during intimate touch and contact.^2 In rodents the release of oxytocin
during mating is thought to increase social recognition of partners through
its tie to the olfactory system (Borrow and Cameron 2012). As I discuss
later, one influential hypothesis is that oxytocin enables the establishment
of partner preference in monogamous species of mammals; another is that
oxytocin facilitates not only physiological but also emotional processes re-
lated to reproduction in pregnant and postpartum mammals. Oxytocin is
believed to interact with systems that release dopamine (a neurotransmitter
linked to pleasure and reward) and adrenal corticotrophic hormone (in-
volved in the production of steroid hormones in response to stress) as well
as memory, and it is associated with learned motivations for attachment
and safety. Empirical and theoretical treatments of oxytocin in social neuro-
science link it to a wide variety of affective experiences, including trust, sup-
pression of fear, romantic love, and parental bonds (Heinrichs et al. 2009).
A new methodology using the nasal administration of oxytocin has
opened up experimental research on oxytocin’s effects in humans. Much
of this work focuses on trust and cooperative behavior. In a typical study,
a group of human subjects is given oxytocin and asked to participate in an
experiment designed to measure a positive social affect; these subjects are
compared with a control group that completes the task without being given
oxytocin.^3 A review by Graustella and MacLeod (2012) summarizes the
findings of nineteen such studies: The administration of oxytocin is pos-
itively correlated with cooperative and trusting behaviors, facial emotion
recognition, and memory for social information; it is negatively correlated
with anxiety and blood pressure in stressful situations. Administered oxy-
tocin is thought to improve social cognition, reduce anxiety, and affect mo-
tivational states related to affiliation, and its deficiency is being proposed as